The prime suspect in the disappearance of Madeleine McCann will not get a fair trial over unrelated sex attacks because the case of the missing girl is too widely known, his lawyers have argued.
Christian Brueckner, a 47-year-old German, is accused of three rapes and two sexual assaults carried out on Portugal’s Algarve coast between 2000 and 2017.
He is already behind bars in Germany for raping a 72-year-old American tourist in 2005 in Praia da Luz, the same seaside resort where Madeleine went missing two years later.
“Our client has been subject to media attention, he has been accused of kidnapping and killing Madeleine McCann by members of the media and prosecutors, without evidence,” Friedrich Fülscher said in Brueckner’s defence.
“We are not dealing with the worst criminal story of the post-war period but it will be hard for the court to put it out of their minds.”
Portuguese police named Brueckner as an “arguido”, or formal suspect, in Madeleine’s disappearance in April 2022, allowing them to override the statute of limitations and continue investigating the case.